Ministry plans Green corridor in highways

Chennai: The Ministry of Shipping and Road Transport is considering having a ‘green corridor’ in highways exclusively for farmers with ‘no toll’ charges.

It will link rural roads with National Highways and will be implemented along with the six-lane project under the National Highways Development Programme, according to Mr. T.R. Baalu, Minister of Shipping and Road Transport.

The total road network in the country is around 33 lakh km. Of this, 25 lakh km is rural roads and 68,000 km is National Highways.

While the farming community is providing a helping hand in the country’s GDP (gross domestic product), the connectivity between the rural roads and the highways is missing.

The ‘green corridor’ will be used by farmers to transport their produce to various warehouses and markets, the minister said in his address at a seminar on ‘Warehousing 2008 – The Warehousing (Development and Regulation Act 2007); Issues and Challenges’ organised by the Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry.

“The green corridor will give impetus to the agricultural economy,” he said. The Union Government and State governments will share the cost, he said without disclosing any numbers or a timeframe for the project.

The project is being discussed within the ministry for the last one week and a policy needs to be worked out, and later taken up with the Planning Commission, he said.